Levithian

Thats a valid feeling, but its in the minority. Its still an excellent ride that should stay open, it just deserves a bit of attention...

I remember reading this too but this article (with info from the lawsuit), claims she was unemployed at the time.

You could work out the risk for yourself and openly discuss anything you think might be an issue or a concern. It has everything to do with the fact that employees (even past ones) are not supposed to share anything from back of house, full stop. They sign media policies and disclosure agreements. You can see anyone who does tread a fine line between ok and giving away too much that might raise the ire of the parks or management. Often this information is shared with people who want to respect the source and the trust placed in them to keep certain details private. Its pretty much how any info makes its way out from behind the scenes. So coming out and detailing in full why things are as they are, or why they do what they do probably isn't going to happen. Not unless its obviously been outed by someone else and its no longer confidential. You have to appreciate there is a difference between discussing the impending debut of a new churro cart vs things surrounding operational procedures, safety or incidents that may have a legal responsibility attached (on both sides). Sometimes you just have to settle with what people are prepared to talk about, and hopefully there is enough info in their posts to understand the person is probably telling the truth. Or you don't. But its probably not going to change their feelings on the matter.

This is starting to get into its own thread territory. Look, i dont feel comfortable talking about all the details. Obviously you dont believe me when i say it was a serious issue that put the continued operation of the ride at risk. As to why so long in operation? Why only now? Thats the point of risk assessments and investigations. Sometimes something happens externally (like incidents on similar rides) and forces greater scruitiny and a focus on risk based on worse case scenarios. It had nothing to do with the new boats or wanting to change the speed of the ride or anything of the sort. Long story short, the water levels were too high/troughs too deep. There was an unacceptable risk found, thoroughly investigated, the safety teams responded as they should have and modifications were made to the depths of the troughs to mitigate the risk. They did everything they should have, credit to the park and the team, it's results allowed continued operation of the ride. I can tell you 100% it would not be in operation today if this process and result had not been completed. Do you understand enough of what i said above to leave it at that, or is this going to be a continued issue? FYI, contrary to what you might think, the water levels were actually raised in the majority of the ride, not lowered. What you are feeling is new concrete ramps and infill panels raising sections of the trough floors. The replacement boats were actually more than 100kg lighter than the old ones and are every bit as boyant. If wild west falls was demolished you would never get another ride like it again. Thats the simple reality. Its nowhere near in the budget for developing another flume as big and as detailed as west is. For all its faults and neglect, its a big, expensive ride. Anything else you think is the problem you want to raise? If you doubt what im saying, go back and look at shutdown photos posted here. Pay close attention to runout 2 (the final drop) and the throughs ahead. Youll see exactly what im talking about and should be able to put 2 + 2 together and work out what the issue might be and why it required these modifications. There are very little complaints from guest about the roughness of the ride following the modifications, so im going out on a limb by saying the majority of people either never noticed or werent phased much by the changes and would still rather the ride stayed open.

Maybe the difference is if it's original works vs a painting of a real landscape. If its all an artwork with no real locations in it, you can copyright the whole artwork, designs, colours, etc. Otherwise, you can still trademark the artwork itself to protect against reproduction, but you can't trademark the real area like buildings, etc. So, if you took the same artwork of the original emerald city and used it as the front for the ride, it's not a real place, so the artwork and design is probably copyrighted and can't just be reproduced. I think this was the issue with the movie disney made? They had to tread a real fine line between anything that looked like the 1939 movie. You're still floating for the most part, just you might feel the bottom sometimes. You know what really removes the immersion? The ride being closed for good because there are safety concerns. Which do you want? live with the changes or have no ride at all? The answer is yes. Have you seen it/ridden it? Its not really themed as well as west and overall it is a smaller ride, but the same thing seems to have happened. I know their boats aren't as big so it might not work, but one thing that would have been amazing is to swap the chain drive of west for lift conveyors used in rio bravo.

Its on a turntable and designed to rotate across an arc as it turns. The cable is on a pulley system and a pneumatic cylinder used to pull the cable a few inches and release it. So the arm of the crane would swing from side to side and the bucket hanging would raise a few inches and drop to give it some movement. The problem you have is some of the best effects are physical/practical. When something wears out or breaks, the whole thing sits and the rest of its mechanical components turn to shit due to lack of use. Instead of fixing it and putting back in service, it just becomes another item in the too hard basket. As far as the water level changes and the speed/roughness now. Unfortunately, it really is a case of without the changes the ride probably wouldnt be in operation today. It was that serious.

Did the land surveyors sign in the harbour sway when you floated past? Did the drag line crane and shovel move over as you passed under before the first lift?

Someone got some pretty poor legal advice. It's not like the USA where people/companies can be held accountable in a civil suit. The operator has liability insurance and they'd make a claim anytime someone tried to sue them, what do the lawyers think will happen when the operators insurance company is engaged and there has been an investigation that found no negligence or responsibility was found? Hell, even if she somehow won, aren't the liability payouts for a whole bunch of different damages capped now? I thought they were introduced due in part because of how the potential for massive payouts like often experienced in the US was driving up insurance premiums in the country so much that businesses were folding because they couldn't pay it. Government had to step in and cap payment figures for different damages to avoid multi million dollar lawsuits.

Unless it has drastically changed in the last few years, none of them use awards. They literally don't mean anything when you draw up an enterprise bargaining agreement. Because it's approved by fairwork it allows you to overwrite any state and federal awards, including things like minimum wages. The reason they don't pay penalty rates for weekend work is the loading is supposed to be built into the base rate. Because the park is open year round, the ordinary hours include weekend work. It's not considered unusual or outside of the scope for the position, so it's not expected you earn penalty rates. Work overtime? that's different. Work events outside of park hours? again, different. In a just world these sorts of things are supposed to be accounted for in the base rate that everyone gets. Everyone is supposed to be paid a little more per hour for sacrificing their time because it's understood that the business operates 7 days a week. It's supposed to all even out in the end with employees working day shifts earning more than they would normally, so when you rotate through to weekend work and earn less its supposed to be balanced. Im reality, none of that happens. Fairwork aren't even supposed to approve any agreement that means an employee is worse off. Just what they define as worse off? worse off than their current agreement? or worse off than the federal minimum? because service staff at theme parks certainly get short changed all round. Stupid thing is they have a lot of power in numbers if they were to band together and issue demands and threaten affirmative action, but history has showed companies have basically bought them off with trivial things (how about lollies and a free bbq day to say thanks?) to get them to agree to new agreements when it comes time to vote. I don't know if they have managed to force changes, but different departments at both companies were trying to break away from the all encompassing eba's because this was happening. New and seasonal service staff were voting on agreements while the long term rostered departments were basically being lumped in with young kids that have never heard of an agreement before, let alone know what their employee rights should be. The only reason why affirmative action hasn't happened in recent memory is because there is very little union membership within employees at either companies anymore.

Because the work culture is toxic, it's a lot about groups within groups, and if you don't fit in or aren't considered "a team player" you get ostracised regardless of your work ethic or how you do your job. Throw in a shoddy EBA that allows them to pay staff drastically less than the actual minimum wage, what do you end up with? Trouble retaining employees. Especially ones that matter. IE, the ones that actually keep the place running.

Elements to a film that is within the public domain are not automatically released when the film copyright expires though. If there have been changes, if character likeness has been reproduced and utilised elsewhere since, copyrights can still exist protecting use of characters and other IP. This goes double for if the original story or character development was from literature or a stage play. Even though the film might lapse, the characters and story may still be copyrighted. Once the film lapses they could revert to their original sources copyright. You could change the likeness of a character and use it in an adaptation, the copyright would cover the likeness used in you adaptation if it was something specific enough. I think something like this happens with the wicked witch of the west. Shes presented differently to Baum's books and her known likeness is copyrighted externally to the source. I dont think it matters if something has entered the public domain in Australia if it still holds existing copyrights in another country. Theres an international accord a lot of countries signed up to, so im pretty sure those are still valid here. The original works may have lapsed and someone could use their likeness and character in a new adapation within Australia, but if the movie still holds copyright with turner, given it departs from the source by quite a lot, you can probably assume that everything specific to their movie adaptation is still copyrighted. Character likeness, names for characters, cities/locations, even visuals of the sets. The US copyright is essentially still valid here too because of the accord. Use any of their character names, location names, image likeness for set designs and characters, you are going to be using it under an IP rights agreement.

To be fare to www, the changes to the pace of the ride and the water levels were in response to the depths and the worry someone could drown if a boat was to be sunk. Wasn't from them, but internally. The station change is an absolute disaster. I wonder if they ever got it to run smoothly. Heres a good recent video. Can really see how much faster the boats travel through the troughs. It points out how little themeing elements are working. Even simple things like lighting (ambient light bleeding in is bad) levels messing up the few effects that work. Its such a shame because I know there have been a number of staff who have really wanted to make a go at fixing these things and bringing them back to a high standard and it always ends the same. Either wont spend enough money, wont dedicate enough time/labour, or won't dedicate enough support to keep the effects repaired/running when they are fixed. Its death by a thousand cuts everywhere you look and the only concerns are if the ride is physically running. The video above doesnt have one single basic effect working in the ghost town. Not even the population sign or the shot up water tank. What a waste of a ride. Especially since the site/sound system got a major upgrade too. Has the potential to do a lot with it given the control system that went in. Just have to try and convince the people that matter to approve budgets to actually get things returned to full/proper operation. You would have been working there when the attitude was still if it's part of the ride, we have to return it to service and repair/maintain it. We cant just let it sit out of service. You can say that about a lot of the park now. Must be frustrating for staff that actually care about the place looking its best.

Not a lot of chance of that now after modifications. Such a large volume of water running through the reverse element and past the geysers, it draws boats into the trough pretty quickly. Have you seen how deep the water is there now? Right up to the end of the overflow pool each side of the runout. Can only just see the top of the rail of the runout itself.

I can remember when they were mandatory daily, as in a requirement to ensure things sounded and felt ok. Vastly different management culture now. Its not permitted to allow joy rides. Biggest opportunity staff often have to ride is when they put the call out for needing weighted trains during testing. If operations could free up the staff, it was easier than loading seats with dummies and water. Good luck with the west checks. How much of the themed elements were repaired even when they were reported daily? Some things were out of service for years. 😂

And to think back at who was promoted ahead of Greg Yong, spurring his departure.....

It's company practice that joy rides are not allowed to happen. Not even for maintenance staff. Risk termination even if you do this without a valid reason for performing a ride check. The execs riding should have been handled during testing, but village are famous for bringing forward deadlines instead of following through with proper testing processes. Rather open earlier than intended or before everything has been really put through its paces, then have it break down with guests aboard, followed by an often lengthy "unscheduled maintenance" period for a brand new ride. You know, it really puts the shine on your new investment. The general public love turning up after reading opening announcements and seeing commercials only to find the new ride is broken. Really makes it seem like they known what they are doing and doesn't question the safety of their rides at all.

The longer shutdown time that crops up for superman sometimes is usually due to a rope change for the winch/catch car and/or hydraulic hoses for the power/drive unit. They aren't done yearly and it's usually staggered as it's preventative maintenance vs required annual maintenance. Same with Batwing. Periodic rope changes add additional time to the yearly maintenance schedule.

The last 12-18 months represent the first time weve really seen ticket prices and passes increase sunstancially in over a decade, which is honestly about time. A race to the bottom benefits nobody and the sales tracking data supports that regardless of how cheap you make the entrance price, it wasnt resulting in significant increases in retail sales. Locals scream about things like cost, plus things like wait times, but then they include big overseas parks in the same statements. Really? Tell me about the time you went to one of the parks and had to pay more for entry because it was busy or during a peak period.

It was always scheduled for a major control system upgrade. Previously relied on a barcode system to keep track of car counts, with no specific car positioning available during the ride. Everything is left up to establishing car order at the start, then relying on proxy sensors to do all the hard work as part of the block system. I hope while they are in there replacing the track they link the high zone catwalks. Will make it easier for all.

Time to employ a falconer.

A thread about arena shows at movieworld and not a single mention of the western action show? Old man Johnson will be turning in his grave!

They look like GIS data/survey marks for underground services. Water, power, etc. Could you see anymore away from the ride? Might not have anything to do with the ride at all, but the location of something underground they have to work on.

Yeah. A stripped out shed forms such an integral part of the new themed land that it really should have been bulldozed and built a new just so that it could be grammatically accurate to all the anoraks of the world.

You're like a broken clock, only you're not right twice a day but completely useless instead. You have absolutely no regard for reality. They could remove superman and reinstate the studio tour and movie magic stage show. What has been changed can be changed again right? The reality is your idea is fundamentally flawed. Come up with a new one grounded in reality of not being able to utilise any of studio grounds. I know. They could fill in the swamp and build on top. They do it for housing estates all the time....

This is not part of the park area anymore. It is fenced off and part of WB studios. No direct access at all from the theme park. You can actually see the dividing fence from the overhead image you posted. And despite what lots of people think, the theme parks and the studios are two separate entities now. They don't share space and access is restricted, plus and they don't give up space from the studios. Simply because studios generates more actual income than the parks do. Want evidence of this? have a look where they created site access for the new area. Storage across the road and road access down a gravel driveway along the boundary fence and around past facilities instead of straight through any choice of 3 nice, paved entrances from studios.